Wow, I Was NOT Expecting That

It would seem that there’s going to be a Gears of War 3. And, like, it’s going to be a game. And a sequel to Gears of War 2 and everything. I bet there’ll be stop-and-pop gunplay in it, and snappy dialogue. And a giant black man nicknamed Cole Train.

1UP breathlessly reports that Gears 3 was accidentally announced due to some glitch in the XBL news system. And since I think we can all agree that no one expected a third game in a series that designer Cliff Bleszinski has always described as a trilogy – especially since the first two games only sold a paltry handful of copies, like TEN FUCKING MILLION EACH or something like that, this is front page stuff.

Cliff was supposed to announce his “new project” on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon last Thursday, but he got bumped for a talking dog or something. Now he’s on tonight, so set your Tivos. Because I was seriously expecting him to announce that his “new project” was going to be a remake of Colossal Cave Adventure, not a new Gears.

About the author

Tap-Repeatedly Overlord Steerpike is a games industry journalist and consultant. His earliest memories are of video games, and hopes his last memories will be of them as well. He’s a featured monthly columnist with the International Game Developers Association, and is internationally published in an assortment of dull e-Learning texts and less dull gaming publications. He also lectures on games at various universities.

11 Responses to Wow, I Was NOT Expecting That

Hanamigi04/12/2010

So much hype, there are great news, I never heard of a trilogy made of THREE chapters!
I mean, that’s so fu*kin’ unexpected WOWZOMGNOOB!

Lewis B04/13/2010

Does anyone actually like the Gears IP? It’s the most hyper-masculine, cliched, Americanised, stereotypical game on the maket today. Are we really that short on ideas within the industry that sequals such as these continue to be flogged to death?

I would love – love I say – to write the script for the third Gears game. Of all the games I play and think “I would have written that differently,” Gears is very close to the top of the list.

Lewis, to truly appreciate Gears you have to play it in a very specific way. This specific way involves:

-About 85 cans of beer (bottles are also acceptable)
-At least 12 cans of Red Bull or a reasonable facsimile thereof
-Two friends (I like to use Tap-Repeatedly Legal Advisor Ajax19 and Tap-Repeatedly Guy Who Checks The Site Every Day But Rarely Comments McShane)
-Several AA batteries
-A copy of Gears of War
-At least one 360 (two or three are safer on account of red rings)
-A house absent of wives, girlfriends, boyfriends, children, or anyone not involved in the game (I can’t stress this enough. Barking dogs are okay, but no humans)
-A selection of food delivery options including but not limited to pizza, Chinese, Thai, and Mexican (at least one of these places must deliver until 4am)
-A weekend

Ajax, McShane and I played through Gears 2 in a single booze and caffeine fueled marathon of splitscreen controller-trading. It was epic. By the end we felt very manly. And hung over.

Ajax1904/13/2010

Steerpike speaks the Truth. It is gospel what he is saying.

It was an epic weekend. With all the proper elements, we had an absolute blast playing through Gears 2. Even the ridiculous and quite boring running through the giant worm’s digestive system part of the game was enjoyable enough.

That said, I did find the whole thing very confusing. Maybe it was the amount beer we consumed, but it seemed like for the first half of the game we spent all of our efforts trying to stop the villains from sinking our last city and then, all of a sudden, we spent the second half of the game trying sink that very same city. I have no idea why we pulled a 180 and, to be honest, I really didn’t care.

I totally agree with Lewis’ statement that Gears is the “most hyper-masculine, cliched, Americanised, stereotypical game on the maket today”, but I can’t say I don’t love playing them. I recognize them for what they are, faults and all, but always have fun with them.

I actually really enjoyed both Gears 1 & 2. Yes you have to turn your mind off when you’re playing them but they’re good enough games. Particularly for the time, I thought Gears was also one of the first 3rd person shooters on next-gen to really nail a proper cover system. It was quick, snappy and changing from cover to cover felt really responsive. It’s also been emulated (but in my opinion, possibly still not matched) since..

Gregg B04/13/2010

I’ve only played Gears on a friend’s console but I couldn’t stand the snappiness of the cover system. I remember on one occasion trying to run down a corridor and Mr Beef Muscle kept hugging the walls every time he so much as brushed one, all the while getting shot to pieces. Perhaps I just needed more practice.

I really liked the slick Uncharted cover system because it just felt natural and predictable. Don’t get me started on GTA IV’s though…

Mat C04/13/2010

Hmm, sounds like that might have been the controls, Gregg. If i remember rightly, the cover system works by pressing one of the face buttons (possibly Y) as appose to proximity to the walls. Then again it’s been a while since I’ve played it..

The cover system in Uncharted (both of them) is excellent too, although Uncharted would have to go down in the “Gears clone” category in that respect. I remember loving Uncharted when that first came out because of it’s similarity to Gears.. in terms of the controls, anyway.

GTA IV had a cover system? The LOL. For shizzle. That game fucking sucks. And Mat C, your placement of the word “borked” is nothing short of spectacular.

I’m with everyone else here: you definitely need to turn your brain off for Gears, but hell if it isn’t a lot of fun. I purchased a brand new copy of Gears 1 in late 2007; I played it for a total of one night, but it was one of the best nights of multi-player gaming I have ever had. 10:00pm – 5:00am, one co-op partner (over XBL) and many, many beers later, the campaign was completed in one night. General RAAM was defeated in the manliest fashion possible: my partner plastered a grenade to the bastard’s backside right before he was obliterated, leaving me 1 on 1 with the monstrosity; my fear subsided in about two seconds after RAAM exploded and I realized what had happened.

I started Gears 2 with the same partner in November of 2008 but we haven’t finished yet. Like Steerpike said, the conditions for a night of play have to be exact: a fuckton of beer, 1.21 Gigawatts of power, 88 mph, and no other (uninvolved) humans.

For what it is, Gears of War is pure beauty. Plus it stole that song from Donnie Darko, which stole it from that guy that I don’t know, who stole it from Tears for Fears, who are totally rad.

[…] by Mat C on May 25, 2010, 12:58 pm In what could quite easily be a direct follow up to our last Wow, I Was NOT Expecting That post, Sony have finally placed an official rubber stamp of confirmation on Killzone 3, to the […]

SoullessCorpBastards06/08/2010

Mass Effect 3? I have no idea what you are talking about. No one has suggested anything of the sort.
Those are unattributed rumors with no substance.
Nothing to see here.
Move along.